The Impacts Of The New Public Management In Europe: A Metaanalysis (Working Paper 3)

Abstract The purpose of this working paper is to rehearse the approach, methods and preliminary findings of the first stage of the EU Seventh Framework programme project Co-ordinating for Cohesion in the Public Sector of the Future (hereafter COCOPS – see www.cocops.eu). This first stage (Work Package 1) was tasked to produce a meta-analysis of the impacts of New Public Management (NPM) reforms across the EU. In this paper, therefore, we will first set out what we mean by (respectively) NPM, impacts and meta-analysis, and then go on to review the substance of our findings thus far. The database currently has over 500 documents, including academic articles and books, government reports and consultancy studies. It covers 23 EU member states, plus Norway, Switzerland and Croatia, plus the European Commission itself. Its contents are not yet absolutely finalised, but our collection, coding and quality checking have reached the point where we do not expect the broad conclusions to change very much. This is therefore an appropriate time to issue a Working Paper.